more than 200 years ago, when the founding fathers of the united states were building their new capital here in washington, they searched for a visual style which would embody their democratic ideals, and they found it in greece and rome in a style which for them, as still for us, embodies harmony, order, and freedom. the west has built its temples to liberty and justice and to money and power in the greek and roman style. you see it in trafalgar square in london and in leningrad in the soviet union. at the root of the western tradition-- in architecture, painting, and sculpture-- is the classical legacy. it's so ingrained in our way of seeing things that we don't notice when we use it in tv, commercials, magazines, coins, even on our credit card. many of our uses for it no doubt would astonish people from the ancient world. but if an ancient greek could be here now, he would recognize this around us and feel that, in some sense, the west is heir to his civilization. the power of this tradition and its hold over our imagination make it difficult for us to see the greeks and romans as th